‘The ship is sinking!’ Missile strikes, panic and a race to save the Rubymar
Chief mate Mahmoud Gwealy awoke to a loud bang that sent the laptop on his chest crashing into his nose. The 29-year-old Egyptian sailor had dozed off for the evening while watching Lebanese soap operas in the upstairs quarters of the Rubymar. The British-owned bulk carrier had been rocking in such high swells that he wondered if it had been slammed by a huge wave.
The cabin lights were out as he stepped into a hallway where sailors of the Egyptian, Syrian and Filipino crew had been gathering in flip-flops and nightclothes, struggling to compose their balance. The shudder that echoed through the hull had felt like an earthquake, one said. Shouting over the wail of alarms, crewmates asked each other: Had something struck the Rubymar? “A big rocket," one said over the crowd.
“In the engine room." Gwealy climbed up to the bridge where the captain took stock of an emergency playing out on one of the few vessels still crossing the Red Sea. One missile had struck the ship in the engine room, and another blasted open the starboard side, the captain said, his ears still ringing from the back-to-back explosions. Water was streaming in, pouring onto the shaft that churned the propeller.
Pipes had burst open. Fire alerts were blaring on a ship packed with 21,000 tons of fertilizer. Months earlier, on another ship in the Ukrainian port of Reni, Gwealy had run to the engine room for cover after Russian airstrikes nearby sent thick smoke across the deck.
His wife, Khloud, had scolded him for rushing to board the Rubymar. Now standing on its bridge, he cursed in Arabic in frustration: “Ya nahaar eswid!"—“Black day!" It was a few minutes before 11 p.m. on Feb.
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